After The Curtain Fell
by Hugger-Of-Trees
Summary: Long years after the events of Monstrous Regiment two bit-part characters bump into each other again. Everyone drifts to Ankh-Morpork in the end. There are obstacles of a difficult past to navigate, not to mention the blasted Undertaking Tonker/Lofty
1. Prologue

**After the Curtain Fell**

**Summary**: Long years after the events of Monstrous Regiment two bit-part characters bump into each other again. And why wouldn't they - everyone drifts to Ankh-Morpork in the end. There are the obstacles of a difficult past to navigate, not to mention the blasted Undertaking. (Tonker/Lofty)

**Warning:** Some of the painful events alluded to in Monstrous Regiment regarding the Grey House will crop up here. I have not gone into anything in great detail but this is not one of my sweetness and light fluff fics. This work contains the after effects of a relationship between two women, so there will be potential femslash overtones.

**Disclaimer:** Terry Pratchett owns the characters and the world they live on. I am grateful for all the brilliant books and make no claims of ownership in any way.

**A/N: **This stands alone. Complete. However, I should add that there is more. These five chapters make up "Book One" of the lives of Tonker and Lofty with books two and three out there somewhere, floating in the ethos. But I'm not planning on inflicting another WIP on you with all the annoyance of dribs and drabs that such a scenario would entail. When I'm done with the second part it will be posted entire. As will the third. Until then, enjoy this: one persons take on what might have happened. (And yes, I am still working on _What Polly Did Next_ so hopefully once I finish belabouring that with the edit stick it will be presented it all its army tinged glory.)

~X~

* * *

**Prologue: Dinner Without Strings**

Autumn came early to Ankh Morpork that year. Chill fogs crept up from the river, filling the streets and loitering around long after they'd outstayed their welcome. This particular evening was an excellent example. The darkness had slunk in towards the end of the afternoon, surprising those working at desks in the city who found themselves squinting at their ledgers earlier and earlier each evening. The streets were full of hunched figures hurrying home, collars turned up against the cold dank miserable air. Swirling up from the Ankh, the mist tapped at the lighted windows along the restaurant mile, the tableau of warm glowing window panes drawing the wistful attention of those scurrying past.

None of the escaping commuters catching a glimpse of the two women sitting so calmly in the window of the curry restaurant on the corner could know that they were struggling to maintain a light conversation whilst gingerly negotiating the great sucking holes of past hurts. Magda reluctantly withdrew her attention from the stallholders making their way home along the darkening streets.

Turning back to that familiar figure across the table she asked "So, where did you go?"

It had taken her this long to finally pluck up courage to broach the four years that lay between them. The question had stalked the table since they'd sat down, hanging heavy over the polite small talk, skulking beneath the forcible light conversation as they examined the menu, ordered, and sat back to wait patiently for the starter to arrive. Neither woman had wanted to be the first to address the past and so they had stuck to neutral topics such as the weather and the latest humorous play on words within the pages of the Times. But by a simple law of averages, one of them would have to break eventually and it was Magda that had succumbed to the gaping silence first.

Tilda looked up from the patterns one long finger was tracing on the cloth and at last met her eyes. "I was," she paused, choosing her words carefully. "I was trained. As an alchemist. The Engineers Guild took me in."

Magda noted distractedly that the restaurant was filling up; couples sliding into small corner tables, groups bustling in, cheeks flushed in the sudden warmth.

"They were interested in things blowing up." Turning to look out of the window she added quietly, "I was good at making things blow up then."

Magda waited patiently. You couldn't push Tilda to talk; you had to wait for the sentences to be ready to come out. It hadn't always been that way, there had been, long ago, a time when words tumbled easily out of that expressive face. The problem then had always been to keep her quiet, to teach her to find caution in her speech. But then a lot of things had been different back then and Magda forced herself to take a series of deep ordered breaths. It was no use thinking on those long ago days, it did no good. One couldn't go around being being angry _all_ the time. She concentrated on the shimmer of her cutlery, relaxing each tense muscles one by one, until the memories were safely back in the box and she could once again raise her eyes. Across the table Tilda was still sat in composed contemplation, unaffected by the bustle around her.

The starters arrived, the waiter efficiently spreading the dishes between them and vanishing back into the hubbub. After an awkward conversation they had decided to order a mixture to share. It looked delicious and, having selected a few tempting items, Magda began her meal, nibbling distractedly at the crisp delicacies while her thoughts remained caught up in the dark haired woman opposite.

_She looked just the same…_

It had been such an incongruous meeting and the idiocy of the scene had kept playing over and over in Magda's mind while she was waiting at the bar for her companion to arrive, wanting a drink but _not_ having one.

_It had started out as such a normal day, the café crowded as usual with the mid morning rush. Magda's mind had been happily blank, her concentration tightly focussed on getting the orders out in time. The morning had been rushing past as usual when she'd looked up in frustration after calling an order twice to find Tilda on the other side of the counter, hand outstretched for the mundane cardboard cup. They'd both stood there frozen in time until Tilda, visibly pulling herself together, had snatched the coffee from her hand and walked out of the door, the little bell jangling in her wake._

_Magda had got back to work immediately, pushing aside any reaction to the odd incident for consideration some other time. She was much too busy to allow her thoughts wander. Her attention solely committed to the task before her she had reached for the next order and got back to work, doing her best to lose herself in the rush. But when she allowed her self to look up after the peak of caffeine addicts had passed by she had found Tilda sitting at the corner table. Waiting._

The restaurant was getting seriously crowded now, the evening crowd filling table after table, calling for the harried waiters and laughing too loudly at poor jokes. Magda calmed her rising discomfort on yet another deep breath as she spooned a little more mango chutney onto her plate. She would much rather be out in the open air, crowds were still not really her thing. But it was too cold to walk the streets and she had adamantly refused to take Tilda to a pub. Not yet, not this time. The waiter came round to refill their water glasses and for a worrying moment it looked like he was going to attempt an attentive hover but catching sight of Magda's expressive scowl he moved off to interrupt one of his other tables instead. Watching him go Magda forced herself to relax back into her chair. She wished she could have a drink.

"We were developing a new method of refining explosives to improve precision." The scent of the food had invaded that far off place that Tilda had retreated to. Reaching for miniature package of spiced vegetables she took a polite nibble and then, as her hunger raised an interested head, she set about loading up her plate. "It was quiet there, out of the city, safer to do that away from people." She paused, the tug of past memories insistent. "I liked being away from people then."

"You were safe?" Magda had no right to ask, but the fear had haunted her for too long for her to stop the words now. "I was afraid, when I couldn't find you, I thought…"

"_No_." The response was quick and very firm. In a gesture of reassurance, full of echoes from the past, Tilda reached forward and squeezed her hand. "I wouldn't do that. You should have known I wouldn't do that." The contact became awkward and both moved back, allowing the space to open up between them again. "I just went away for a while." Realising she was falling behind in the eating stakes, Tilda lifted her fork and dug in.

They finished the small selection in silence. The waiter fluttered past and removed the plates, leaving them for a few precious quiet minutes before bringing the main course to the table. They had ordered individual dishes for this course and Tilda separated out the thick stews and rice efficiently. Both dug in without further comment. Hunger was a pragmatic need even in the face of deep emotional turmoil and it had been a long day.

"How are you?" Swallowing a piece of bread Tilda had forced out her own question. It fell between them like the ubiquitous stone into a millpond and the ripples of painful silence ran out across the table to jut up against the shore. Magda didn't answer immediately, her eyes hidden as she carefully returned the glass she had been just about to take a drink from to the table. Searching for but finding no help in the slightly soiled tablecloth her gaze wiggled away to the more interesting spectacle of a couple walking arm in arm along the opposite pavement.

"Better than I was" she produced eventually. The admission stuck in her throat. Tracing a food stain on the cloth she took a deep breath of courage and continued. "After you left I... it wasn't great." She halted, fighting a wave of sickening memories and felt a hand lightly cover hers for a moment.

Sitting there, trapped by the table in front, a large gentleman in the chair behind and a waiter with an overly large tray beside her, Magda watched her plans for the evening go up in smoke. She hadn't meant to bring this up now. The idea had been to keep conversation light, impersonal. All she had wanted was to say hi, check that Tilda was okay and maybe catch up a little if it wasn't too much of an effort. And now she had ruined everything.

But that hand was still resting lightly over hers.

Tumbled about in the unexpected rapids of what had been a calm stream of conversation Magda spotted a beautiful overhanging branch that screamed of rescue and pointing her fork at a bowl of steaming vegetables she asked lightly "Are you gonna eat all that?"

Tilda smiled and pushed the bowl across the table and as Magda dug her fork into the potatoes the tension began to wash out of the moment on gentle waves. Having successfully negotiated the unanticipated rough water Magda was able to reply to Tilda's generous gesture by pushing over her own highly spiced dish and they shared the remainder of the assortment between them. Some went together better than others but such exploration was a neutral conversation ground and they managed to pass the rest of the meal in companionable experimentation.

"So, you're back in the wonderful place that is Ankh Morpork?" Magda sopped up the last of the sauce on her plate with some bread. "What brings you back here then?"

"I've only been back a short while, I came down a few months after _Alls Fallow_.**[1]** They've been having problems with the _Undertaking._"

"The Guild dragged you into that mess? Oh dear." Magda sat back in her chair, attempting but failing to hide the look of pity that flashed across her face. "They've really stitched you up, you know that?"

"Hey!" Tilda's annoyance was partly genuine but mostly exaggerated. "It's a good idea in theory."

"In _theory_ yeah. In _practice_ it's a colossal cock-up, half the roads in the city are closed due to massive holes in the pavements, and the rest are clogged solid from sun-up to sun-down with "_Undertaking_" traffic and dirt movers. The noise of the work is driving the whole population mad, not to mention the dust that gets everywhere in summer and covers the roads inches deep in mud in the winter. It's a damned waste of time."

Across the table Tilda folded her hands delicately before commenting: "I see you hold strong feelings on the matter then."

This would have been the ideal moment for Magda to incline her head graciously and take the higher road as she accepted her companions light censure. As it was, she took the opportunity to vent the last remnants of her irritation by flicking a small remnant of bread over the expanse between them and muttering gracelessly "me and the rest of the city." Tilda laughed, a surprising sound that startled Magda. She hadn't heard that soft chuckle for such a long time and yet as she sat there it still felt like only yesterday, how was that possible? As the bread came back at her at high speed Magda couldn't hide her smile even as she shook her head and warned of terrible consequences to come of getting involved in "that mess."

The dishes between them were empty. Tilda chased the last grains of rice around her plate before sitting back in her chair with a sigh of enjoyment.

"My work isn't really anything to do with the tunnels you know. I'm more… specialised."

"Are they _really_ going to blow up the Patricians Palace so that they can put a track down to the river? I thought that was just a rumour."

Tilda had to hide a smile behind her hand. "I can't really say. It's sort of classified."

Magda couldn't quite stifle her frustrated sigh but the conversation was interrupted by the hovering waiter and his desert menus. Unanimously deciding to drop the subject of civil engineering and public transport for the moment they turned their attention to the choices available for the discerning diner in the way of desert. Magda tried to return to the topic after they had handed the menus back, but Tilda, unable to discuss anything about her work and not really wiling to defend the project as a whole in the face of an irate citizen, danced around the subject until her questioner gave up in despair.

Digging into her ice-cream it was Tilda who switched the conversation back into the lines Magda had so artfully been avoiding.

"It was odd to bump into you again. I thought perhaps you'd moved on."

"Surprising, no? In a city this big." Magda carefully sidestepped the moving on comment. "I didn't think you drank coffee."

"All engineers drink coffee," Tilda smiled again and this time it stayed. "It's where we get our best ideas, and our craziest! You've seen those new Clacks towers, right? Born out of an all-night coffee buffet at _Joe's_."

Ah coffee. Magda could talk that about for hours. Four months as a Barista had provided her with a detailed introduction to the world of caffeination. She settled more comfortably into her seat and prepared for a discussion on the benefits of double filtered and the problems associated with the new steam driven system found in the most expensive coffee houses. The conversation drifted amicably from random topic to random topic as they finished up their meal.

Later, walking through the streets with that dark head keeping pace at her shoulder Magda realised she was waiting for a small hand to creep into hers. Still. Even after all these years. She sighed and put the idea from her mind. Wasn't it enough to know that Tilda was alive and well? Couldn't she just be satisfied that they were able to walk through the city without too many awkward silences? As they turned into a quieter side street Magda stopped suddenly.

"Tilly. Wait a minute."

Her companion drifted to a halt in the middle of the pavement just a few steps ahead and looked back at her curiously.

"Did you know I tried to find you? Not then. After." Tilda was still waiting, a faint look of incomprehension drifting across her face and Magda felt again the old frustration of that damn inability to ever find the right words. Oh, she remembered _this_ situation well. "I wanted to apologise." Faced with Tilda's persisting expression of confusion Magda broke into a wry smile. "It's part of the programme. _Step_ _Nine: Make Amends_. Though I still don't know what I would have said. There aren't really any words…" Her voice tailed off again.

"You found me now."

Standing there on that dismal street listening to those calm words spoken so easily Magda felt a weight drop away. Somewhere out there Tilda was still talking, but all Magda could grasp was that, despite everything, she _was_ Tilly again. The old Tilda, whom Magda had feared lost to the fire those long years ago, lived again. She had grieved for that beautiful girl, grieved despite the successful struggle the remnants of her friend had made to claw her way back into the light. As Tilda had made those first fragile steps out of darkness Magda had welcomed her shaky shadow back with desperate relief and kept her own grief hidden, only able to mourn in secret for the loss of that hopeful little girl she had once known. Her every effort had been concentrated on helping Til with her difficult climb and so she'd vowed to put away all the burning rage against those who had so easily taken away everything from them. But unfortunately, as they'd found out only too soon in those terrible days before Tilda left, Magda wasn't that good at pushing away things she didn't want to think about...

Shaking her head Magda pulled her attention back to the present, focusing instead on the woman before her who had done more than recover her strength but had gone on to grow and blossom. In the rapid chatter and fluttering hands she could see again the Tilda she'd first met as a child. That child who had contained mountains of potential, who was sure of what she knew and unafraid to speak it aloud. The original Tilda who was smart and intelligent and could explain anything given enough of a run up and some dust to write in. She was…

"…those words will do to start with."

Magda abruptly realised she'd missed an important part of the conversation.

"I said:'an apology will do to start with." As Tilda repeated her calm statement Magda's heart rejoiced to see the return of the emphatic eyebrows. Tilda went on to add, "I hereby officially accept yours." A small smile crept onto her face for a moment before slipping away as she shivered in the chill. "I should go. I have a busy day tomorrow. Thanks for dinner."

She held out her hand, boundaries obvious. Magda took it gently and held it in both of hers like the precious thing it was.

"Don't disappear on me again, ok?" It slipped out before she could swallow back the pleading words.

But Tilda didn't react, merely smiling and smoothly disengaging her hand. "You make good coffee, I'm sure I'll pop in sometime."

And then she was gone.

~X~

**[1] **Lying in the middle of the second summer (due to the intrinsic difficulties of a flat world the disc has eight seasons instead of the more customary four), _Alls Fallow_ is the switch side of our Halloween, when witches stay abed and enjoy a night snuggled up under the covers rather than having to be out-and-about freezing certain appendages off. In Earth terms, Tilda came down to Ankh Morpork at the end of the summer, toward the early autumn.


	2. Second Chances

**Chapter 1: Second Chances**

Tilda didn't come back to the café the next day. Or the day after that. Magda didn't think about it more than three times a minute, it didn't help to dwell on such things. Life went on. She served coffee quickly and efficiently to people who weren't Tilda. Fredriks completed the crossword in the Times in under twenty-five minutes for the first time ever and after declaring it lacked challenge he moved on the Agatean number puzzle instead. Cynthia managed to get a second date with the latest paramour and missed her espresso pick-up two mornings in a row. And they all nearly died of shock when Sweet-Andy cut his order down to two sugars instead of the usual five.

None of these exciting high-points managed to distract Magda from her circling thoughts.

~X~

Matilda Tewt didn't know what to do.

Obviously the _first_ thing to do was to stop biting the end of her pencil, this was the fourth one she'd ruined in as many days. She should have gone back to the café the next day, ordered a coffee, smiled at the barista and walked on out. That would have made it clear that to all and sundry that she was pleased to have bumped into an old friend but she didn't really have time in her life at the moment to make the effort of re-connecting. One day would have been all it would have taken. Done and dusted and she could have got on with her life, the odd meeting in the café just another humorous example of coincidences in the big city.

_But this wasn't just any old friend was it?_ This was Tonker. Tonker who had been there at the very beginning and walked beside her every step of that painful road. Who had got her out of _that place_ and carried her over the mountains. The girl had saved her; didn't she owe their shared past something more than a forced smile and the occasional tip for exceptional service?

The pencil cracked under Tilda's teeth and she threw it into the waste basket with the others.

_That was the problem wasn't it._ If that was the only history they'd shared she would have walked into that café the very next day and made every effort to find whatever time she could in her busy schedule for the woman with the quiet eyes and the closed face behind the counter. The woman who had been kind enough to save her life. But that wasn't everything this woman meant to her. This was Magda. The woman whom she had loved.

_And that, right there, that was the rub._ Tilda had given her heart to this girl, this woman. Had loved her with everything she had for a few short years and then walked away from her. Did it even matter that it had almost killed her to do so? Tilda couldn't walk back into that situation however much she wanted to. She knew that if she asked those arms would reach out in a second to envelop her and keep her safe. Magda was hard-wired that way. But Matilda Tewt had spent a long time building herself up from that broken young woman who'd run out into the night, tears streaming down her face, those long years ago and she wasn't going to throw it all away for some old memories and the reminders of beauty in an escaping tendril of red hair.

_She'd had to go. Magda had left her no choice._

But worryingly, even now a small part of her still didn't quite believe. Tilda reached for her desk drawer, but on opening it found she'd finally exhausted her pencil supply. If she wanted something to chew on to banish this headache she'd have to venture out of the office. As she hauled herself to her feet she caught sight of the latest report from the boys downstairs. The decision would have to wait; she had lab data to evaluate. Picking up her pen she turned the first page and bent her attention to the tables lain out before her.

Tilda couldn't go back to that life. But it seemed she couldn't walk away either.

~X~

Magda handed over another hot chocolate and after discovering that there were no more orders in the queue she let herself drift. It had been a week now. She'd been unable to stop herself walking past the Engineers Guild a couple of times. Each time she'd not seen the face she was searching for, unsurprising considering she didn't know the first thing about Tilda's routine. Each time, once around the corner out of sight, she'd admonished herself for behaving in such a stupid manner.

Tilda didn't owe her anything, she knew that. Magda Halter had made her bed and up till now she'd been perfectly content to make shift on its lumpy surface. But despite her denials the memories still kept coming, striking her at unexpected moments and often catching her off balance.

Thinking about the thing properly, it did make a funny kind of sense. Magda's mind had almost fifteen years of memories that in some way or other included a small dark haired figure to select from so it was only natural that laying eyes on the woman again would churn up some images. As she absently wiped down the counter the pictures danced into life again and this time Magda didn't try and force them away. Un-noticed by the customers who were naturally more interested in their caffeination processes than a mere serving wench a tiny smile tugged at the corners of her mouth.

But she didn't get the chance to delve into her reminiscences for long as her thoughts were rudely interrupted by the bell over the door and a noisy group of boisterous young folk poured in. She sighed, warming up the coffee machine again for the rush but was stopped in her tracks by the figure trailing in at the back of the group.

It was Tilda, large as life and twice as welcome, her chin jutted up and out in that old familiar gesture.

~X~

Tilda had got caught up in the rush for coffee despite herself. They'd had an unproductive week. For some as yet undetermined reason although the model worked perfectly when they'd tried it in the lab, the minute she'd attempted to demonstrate it they'd blown the _floggle-toggle_[1] and left a nasty stain on the bench. Though she had a million and one other things to do Tilda had volunteered to give the lab rats a hand with the laborious process of tracking down all the pieces and putting it back together. She'd hoped the fiddly intricate work might calm her mind but it swiftly became apparent that it was the upper _floggle-toggle_ that had gone, not the lower one, and despite hunting high and low they'd been unable to find a vital part of the second pressure dissipation coil assembly. In the end Janey had thrown her hands in the air in frustration, declared the model to be possessed by evil spirits and hustled them all out for a coffee break.

Walking in the midst of the group busily discussing – with a wide range of emphatic gestures - the complete and utter impossibility of producing decent results with the low level equipment the Guild persisted in using, Tilda hadn't noticed where they were headed. As she picked her way along the raised flag-way, weaving in and out of the various street vendors, she'd found herself jostled to the rear of the group. Thus it was that, after halting momentarily to tip the street sweeper, she'd had to hurry to catch up with the tail end of her staff before they vanished into a brightly light coffee emporium. It was only as she caught the door as it swung back that she realised they were walking into what her brain persisted in calling "_Magda's Café_". By then it was too late, she had no real reason to turn back and no explanation she could share with her colleagues. Avoiding Janey's curious stare at her startled stumble she put up her chin and walked inside.

[1] For an idea of the vital importance of a _floggle-toggle_ look up almost any episode of "_The Navy Lark_"

~X~

"Wasn't that…?"

"Yeah." Magda moved out from behind the counter to collect the coffee cups and general detritus the group of engineers had left behind. Without them the café was suddenly quiet and empty, only Fredriks in the corner looking up from his fruitless hunt for another nine to place in the top right square. He knew something of the story, having wandered in one morning to find Magda asking the coffee grinder why it was that she was bothered what dark haired women thought about her anyway.

He'd asked and she'd been so startled that she'd told him the summarised version whilst brewing his extra-strong-double-filtered morning wake-up call. She hadn't glossed over her part in the proceedings but in return he hadn't retreated behind the barrier of disappointment she'd got used to. Fredriks was a quiet man who had lived a quiet life, but he'd said enough to make it clear that he was rooting for her despite the odds.

"She seemed a little…"

"Yeah." Magda placed the last of the cups into the tray and carried it out into the back pantry. There was washing up to be done and that was a really good excuse not to be talking to anyone at this moment in time.

~X~

"So, who was that?"

Tilda looked up from the technical drawing she was adding careful notes to and caught Janey slipping into the office, closing the door behind her. Having determined that the intruder was in full intelligence-gathering mode she put down her pen and prepared for damage control.

"Shouldn't you be writing reports?"

Janey shrugged. "I've got a minion working on them. I was much more interested in the little '_entertainment_' I caught in a certain café this morning. Care to share what was going on?"

Tilda dropped her eyes from that enquiring gaze with a muttered "nuffin." Picking up the ever present pencil she attempted to give out an air of someone who was extremely busy with important things that a lowly (chief) lab technician shouldn't be interrupting.

"So, the little conversation you were having with the serving girl, that was nothing?" Tilda shrugged, her attention absolutely completely and unwaveringly on the diagram she was editing.

"Do you usually ice-maiden perfectly competent baristas?"

Tilda added a line to the drawing, joining two unimportant looking points. She noted dispassionately that her interrogator was only asking questions that could be answered with a yes or no, and that as yet Janey didn't seem too frustrated by the lack of answers she was receiving.

"Sooo…" Janey began the relaxed stroll that generally accompanied a beautifully simple explanation of some hideously complicated concept. "I'm guessing you guys knew each other, probably sometime back before you turned up in my lab with that lost look and those detailed formulae on energy transference."

Tilda found another two points to connect. Perhaps if she went on long enough she could turn the cutaway section into a cheerful doggie or perhaps a sailboat.

"I'm assuming from the ice-maiden performance that it wasn't just a casual relationship and that when it went south it went with something of a bang." Tilda couldn't find the energy to do more than nod to that. Talk about the understatement of the month.

"I'm sorry T." Janey rested a hand for a moment over the fingers that were manipulating the pencil so skilfully. "So what happened? You just bumped into her there?"

"We had dinner." Tilda found herself explaining about the meeting and then how she'd gone back and how there'd been a dinner situation. She didn't go into much detail; it was difficult enough even to share the little she did. She had always been thankful that Janey had never pushed, merely accepting that there were things Tilda didn't talk about. In those early days the lab tech may have noticed that her clever associate spent more hours staring at the candle flame than the formulae she claimed to be working on but Janey had never commented. The technician had shared confidences easily but had never demanded that her friend reciprocate.

"Janey?" Tilda looked up from the pencil she was twiddling between nervous fingers; she definitely had an affinity for wood-coated graphite implements in times of stress. "You won't say anything, will you?"

"I promise." Janey crossed her heart in the old Ankh Morpork youngster fashion, with appropriate detailed gestures and blood curdling noises before settling back against the desk. "What are you going to do now?"

Tilda shrugged miserably. She hadn't solved the previous conundrum of what to do after seeing Magda the first time never-mind any new problems that arose from bumping into her again.

"As I see it, you could carry on as you are, but looking at that drawing as your chief lab tech I don't think I should allow that. We're on a tight enough schedule already without you drawing Laddie the Wonder Dog on my latest model blueprints."

Tilda looked down at what she had been doing, put the pencil away from her with precise control and sat back in her chair to avoid further temptation.

"So, you have three choices. One, you totally ignore the woman. It shouldn't be that difficult, there are any number of coffee shops in this neighbourhood. Two, you go all out the other way, have the talk with her and sort out whatever it was that went wrong in the first place. Knowing you, I'm not holding my breath for that one." Janey looked up from counting off the options on her fingers, caught Tilda's rueful glance and nodded to herself.

"That leaves us with number three, you don't avoid her, but you don't pursue her either, and we attempt polite conversation when we run into our mystery friend rather than the little miss ice-maiden demonstration you were showcasing earlier. I'm keenest on number three myself. I mean, from what I saw in the café, she seems to be reasonable about the whole thing. She's not pushing is she?"

The head shake Tilda produced in denial was firm.

"Then we might at least pop by sometimes. They do have those _really_ good croissants." Janey moved round the table and rested a hand on a thin shoulder. "Don't fret too much over it T, it's likely to be not that big a deal when all's said and done."

Tilda sat passively under her hand, not complaining but not responding either. Janey, her objective met for the time being, withdrew her touch. Thinking one in-depth probing conversation was probably enough for the day she left the discussion about the propensity for _floggle-toggle_ explosion until tomorrow. She turned back in the doorway, flashing a grin.

"It's a good drawing of Laddie though. I was really impressed how you managed to blend the support beams into his jaw-line." Tilda sighed and shook her head but couldn't quite hide the smile.

~X~

Two weeks later and in quite a different area of the city a tired woman with unexplained coffee stains on her sleeve slipped into a welcoming pub and pushed her way through the press of people towards a cheerfully chattering group in a corner. The volume level in the low ceilinged room was that only achievable by hard-working folk taking their well deserved ease and only one of the group clearly heard the words she uttered as she came up alongside.

"She came back."

"What's that?" The huddle around the table opened up like a flower turning to the morning sun, five pairs of eyes settling on the figure hovering on the outer edge of their circle, glass of lemonade in hand.

"Don't ask. Gods, what a day." Placing the glass on the table Tonker reached behind her for a convenient low stool. Eyeing the minuscule gap that had been created by an energetic Mexican Wave of shuffling chairs she nudged the space a final smidgeon wider and inserted herself into the group with a sigh. Five pairs of eyes watched a hand reach out toward the bowl of peanuts in the centre of the table and return slowly to a thin mouth. Five pairs of ears picked up the sound of crunching. Three curious minds wondered who would ask first**[1]**.

"Should we guess?" Anne had spent far too much of her day fighting through an unsteady tower of Form 21.2.6.b (in triplicate). To be fair this was considered a normal workload for Vetinari's senior clerks and thus perfectly bearable but today she'd been exposed to the penchant for distraction and persistent stupidity that inflicted so many Ankh Morpork bureaucrats. The two G&Ts flowing through her system were doing their damnedest to take the edge off her headache but unfortunately they had as yet had no effect on the ache rising from her feet. This was somewhat impinging on her overall ability to care.

"Hmm?" Tonker reached out for another peanut.

"Your exciting and interesting news."

"At least wait until I get back." Unable to resist the inevitable any longer Charlie slipped from her stool and vanished through the crowd in the direction of a clearly labelled door leading to the back alley. Shapio, watching her go, was nudged by her neighbour and quietly reminded that as Watchmen were sacrosanct these days _nothing_ would dare approach the woman whilst she attended to the natural order of things. Forcing her attention back to the table she reached for a handful of peanuts before allowing Nell to draw her into conversation.

In the assumed privacy at the other end of the table Rhijan and Anne leant in, Anne tapping the table to gain Tonker's attention.

"Share the wealth, T?"

For a moment the decision hung in the balance, Tonker hovering over the option of retreating behind old well-known walls, but then she gave in, pushing the bowl towards them with a sigh.

"Tonker?" Rhijan prompted gently as she took a peanut.

"Tilda came to the café this morning, I caught her wandering up the street as I was putting the sign out."

She had shared the bare bones of the situation with these two before, the shock of seeing Tilda staring at her over the counter that otherwise acceptable morning causing her to blurt out the details over a hurriedly called lunch. _"She got better, I got worse, we broke up" _might not have been enough to satisfy anyone else, but these old friends were somewhat used to reading between her lines by now. Unseen beneath the table a shoe came to rest against Tonker's sturdy boot with a comforting pressure. However when she looked up Anne seemed unaware of her actions, examining the last half inch of alcohol in her glass as though considering whether she could bear to wait until the end of the story before heading to the bar for a refill.

"It's almost a regular thing now, she pops in on her way to the guild before starting her incredibly busy and important day."

"Has she said anything?" Rhijan's simple enquiry encompassed darkly swirling depths that of course polite dwarfs would not allude to in mixed company and the two shared a glance over their identical lemonades.

"Not a word." Tonker tilted her glass, watching the bubbles swirl. "Not that any of the early customers can produce much more than a grunt anyway."

"But she comes back."

"Yeah." Her somewhat heavy sigh gave birth to a new eddy in the ripples on the surface of her drink. Three people sat around an unappetising bowl of peanuts looking at two almost empty glasses and one half full (or half empty depending on the state of mind of the lookee). They looked at the drinks. They drank the drinks.

"Ah, soddit." Tonker lifted her gaze at that. Anne wasn't precisely smiling to be sure, but there was something of a quirk at the corner of her mouth as she shrugged. She was right of course. With there being a sum total of nothing they could do about the situation, the best option was to swear comprehensively and move on. The quirk was tugging at the corner of Tonker's mouth now, evidently passing through the infectious stage of its lifecycle.

"Soddit." They clinked their glasses together and the conversation moved on.

When Charlie returned, accompanied by two fresh glasses of beer, it was to a table of quiet chatter, the bowl of peanuts in the centre now decidedly lower on content than when she'd left.

"So, what did we find out?" She settled herself comfortably back into place, sliding the second pint over to her pink haired neighbour.

"So far, absolutely nothing." Shapio received the lowered eyebrow of disappointment without any noticeable effect. "We were waiting for you."

"Thought we might give you the chance to try out those red-hot investigative skills they've been supposedly teaching you at that cadet school."

"Too kind." It wasn't the first time Anne had made a somewhat unflattering reference to Charlie's chosen profession since she had been incorporated into their little group and it wouldn't be the last. Obviously she still blamed the Watchwoman for the privately negotiated dissolving of the restrained Tonker/Charlie agreement. Either that or Anne had unresolved feelings regarding Shapio, which was a frighteningly horrific thought. Charlie winced and returned to the object of interrogation. "Tonker?"

"Fresher's week." A series of understanding nods drifted around the table at her hastily grabbed explanation. "Why do they never bother to make good use of time they spend queuing? Why wait until they get to the counter to decide they don't know what they want to order? I swear, if we served a type of coffee called an '_umm_' we'd have made a fortune today." Tonker scowled into the remains of her beverage at the incomprehensibility of youth.

"So, tell us." Nell leant forward, curious. "What's this year's fashionable beverage?"

"The Monkey Wrench." Tonker rode out the laugh with equability. "It's apparently 3 shots with a twist."

Undercover of the continuing laughter Charlie found herself on the receiving end of a quelling nudge from her left. The warning frown directed her way clearly indicated that any further questioning would lead to the removal of valued privileges.

"Drink?" Anne pushed back her stool and, gathering up the empties, she glanced about the table for orders.

Using her elbows with discrimination Anne shoved her way through the crowd. As she shouted her order (one G &T, two lemonades, one heartily quaffable beer) she felt someone hop up beside her at the bar. Looking round warily her eyes floundered in empty space. She dropped her gaze and met worried eyes over a neatly trimmed beard.

"What was all that about then, paper pusher?"

"Not really the time, Gneisscrusher." The drinks landed on the bar in front of them with an enthusiastic thud and more grateful for the distraction than she cared to admit, Anne handed over the money. Beside her Nell (Anneal but not to her friends) shrugged and reached for her beer.

"Is she gonna be ok?"

They turned around, hands full of glasses and took in the noisy group at the table. Charlie appeared to be deep in the intricacies of a comedic anecdote and even from across the room they could see Tonker's shoulders relaxing as Shapio leant in to either encourage or deny the accusations.

"She'll get there." Anne hoisted her purse tighter under her arm as she followed Nell back to the table. The laughter reached out to welcome them back and depositing the lemonade in front of its grateful owner she slipped into her seat completing the circle.

**[1]** One mind was distracted by the barmaid who was reaching up to the top row of optics and the final occupant of the table had been wondering for a good while now if it was time to _crack the seal_ or whether another pint could be slipped in before a visit to the back alley was called for.

~X~


	3. Walking and Talking

**A/N:** This chapter refers to a relationship between two women. No sordid detail, but you are warned if that's not your thing.

**

* * *

Chapter 2: Walking and Talking**

"_Extra Extra! Read all about it! 'Undertaking Delays Not Due To The Wrong Kind Of Dwarfs' Says Guild. Questions Asked In Privy Council. Read all about it!!_"

Magda Halter, pushing her way through the Saturday crowd, glanced back over her shoulder and realised she had lost her tail. Scanning the throng in sudden concern, she picked out the flash of tidy dark hair beneath a smart hat that was valiantly forging through the press of people and waited for Tilda to catch up. "Almost there" she said as the tide of humanity spat up the woman into the calm shelter under the wall. Assured that her companion was still in one piece she led off again, cutting across the pack to slip between two stalls on the other side, emerging gratefully into a relatively quiet side street.

"Sorry about that." Magda glanced anxiously at the smaller woman as they strolled on, glad to be able at last to walk side by side and talk at a normal volume. "The streets round the market are always crazy at this time of day, I should have remembered."

"It's OK." Tilda rubbed gently at her ribs where an over eager matron had shunted her to one side in a quest for the freshest cabbage. "I haven't had much of a chance to see the real Ankh Morpork. I admit it wasn't the introduction to the city I originally envisaged, but it's good to be out of the guild."

"You've been busy?" _Something_ had been taking up the engineer's time; Tilda hadn't been in for her wake-up coffee for over two weeks. Oh yes, messengers had come and gone, collecting large orders at all times of the day and night, but Magda could never be sure whether any of those had been for Tilda's group of lunatics. The engineer might have just gone out of town. Or found another coffee shop she liked better.

Magda had prepared those orders carefully, just in case.

Picking her way through the frozen puddles that were scattered haphazardly along the rough back street, Tilda cast her mind back to the frenzied week. "It's been… a bit more complicated than we envisaged."

That was understating the case somewhat, making as it did no mention of the frustrating struggle to get the prototype operating, the discovery of another, as yet unidentified issue with her carefully worked out theory of air fluid dynamics, the long long days and late nights alone in the office, squinting at plans and equations. It had been a hard month for them all and Janey, finding her asleep over her paperwork, had insisted that she take a day off. Eventually, the headache beating at her temples draining her of all fighting spirit, Tilda had agreed.

And so here she was, looking about her at a city that had somehow bypassed autumn and got stuck into its winter display when she wasn't paying attention. Wood-smoke hung heavy in the air, doing its best to draw a veil between the intrusive scent of an Ankh Morpork street and the eager tourist. The sky above was clear and all about her the breath of passers-by wreathed magical swirls and curlicues in the air. Pulling her scarf higher around her neck she drew in a deep lungful of the chill air, allowing it to wash the stuffy leftover equations from her mind. Drawing the focus of her attention back to her guide she enquired as to whether they were anywhere near their destination.

"It's just down here." Magda led the way down an even smaller alley. "Everyone'll tell you to go to Tiajic's but Ivanov has always had the best sausage."

Tilda could hear the bustle drifting toward them from where the alley came out into one of the main cross streets. As she followed that leading back under its too thin jacket she wondered if perhaps this had been a good idea after all. Facing a day of lying in bed attempting to sleep and fretting about her equations, pacing the guild niggling at her equations or wandering the frighteningly loud city alone whilst worrying about her equations she'd instead taken a leap in the dark and slipped into the café to ask Magda if she would be able to take her down to Little Uberwald so she could get some groceries.

Tilda still wasn't sure what she'd expected but after a moment of stunned silence Magda had admitted that she didn't work Saturday afternoons She'd then volunteered that she did know her way around that area of town and could probably show Tilda a few places, were that what she wanted.

Tilda had said yes, she did.

Now, the paper bag of black bread tucked under one arm, Tilda had to admit that it was nothing like what she'd envisaged. From overheard conversations and her own vague enquiries she'd learnt that this area of town was full of refugees, streets lined with people from the old country, smoking the old weed in old pipes and bemoaning the loss of old farms and cottages back in the old mountains. However, all evidence to the contrary it appeared that most of Ankh Morpork dropped into Little Uberwald on a weekend, tourists and eager shoppers alike. The main streets were crowded with a multitude of accents and though she heard a familiar word here and there, it seemed you were just as likely to hear a deliver boy sworn at in a broad Sto accent than in the sharper vowels of the home country she'd been stiffening herself against.

The smells on the other hand were startling recognizable, the scent of bread, the tang of sausage mixed with charcoal, the ever pervasive aroma of the eponymous thin stew that steamed from large cauldrons on every other stall. Ah, that stew. Given enough time even a Borogravian might be able to forget the coating of grease without transfer of taste that such a meal bestowed on the back of the tongue. Providing the proof of this were the black coated and shawl wrapped figures gathered around these stalls with bowl and bread in hand, muttering appreciatively as they spooned the thin liquid toward amnesic taste buds.

Tilda was lost.

"Magda? Can we get some?" She gestured toward the tightly clustered gathering and Magda gaped at her in disbelief.

"You want to eat that?"

"Please?" She tugged at Magda's sleeve, dragging her in the direction of the nearest stall wafting savoury smells through the crowds. Sighing and rolling her eyes at this tourist behaviour Magda allowed herself to be pulled along, indicating with an expressive shrug that she was more than willing to allow such insanity as long as no-one expected her to participate.

It tasted as bad as Tilda remembered. The addition of herbs and seasoning (an Ankh Morpork touch) couldn't disguise the baseline flavours of fat and bland vegetables. Even the out-of-place chunks of meat bobbing amongst the thin gruel couldn't save it. Tilda made a good job of it, dipping the chunk of bread into the liquid to alleviate much of the grease (a true Borogravian never quite forgot how) and picking out the most flavoursome vegetable chunks. Eventually, avoiding Magda's eyes she handed over the remainder to one of the many scrawny children begging amongst the crowd. Times were obviously hard because the kid slurped it down eagerly, drawing a cringe from both women as they moved away.

Dragging the focus back onto their original objective for entering this confusing muddle Magda led off in the direction of Ivanov's Butchery and Assorted Meats. Once done there she led off again, this time in the direction of a small grocers shop, its size augmented by the vibrant display of fruit and vegetable products that stretched out to block half the street.

"Pickles" she muttered in explanation, before vanishing through the brightly coloured curtain of thin chains that served purpose as a door. As Tilda followed a hand reached out to hold back the swinging barrier, allowing her access and she murmured her thanks, slipping past Magda to duck into the shop. Once inside she halted in amazement. The tiny shop was crammed with products, with shelves stretching up to the ceiling, marking out narrow isles just wide enough to squeeze along in search of a well remembered staple or abruptly recollected taste of home.

As she paid for her purchases Magda reached for the mesh bag and Tilda realised that she would have to say something. Admittedly the bag _was_ likely to be heavy, what with the large jar of pickles and other essentials, but Magda had reached for the sausage in the butchers as well. And she'd been somewhat overly conscientious about the opening of doors and clearing an protective path through the crowds.

"Magda." Without thinking she placed a firm hand over the thin wrist. The woman froze at her touch. Tilda had to harden her heart not to lift her hand away, knowing instinctively as she did the effect the contact was having on the woman tense beside her. "Let me take it this time." But the result she was waiting for didn't happen and so Tilda spoke again more forcefully. "Let go, Tonker! Let me carry it."

Magda turned and left without a word. Thanking the shopkeeper and gathering up her purchases in an untidy armful Tilda hurried after that dignified figure. Reaching the street she looked around frantically before spotting a stiff figure further down in the shadows. Coming up alongside she found Magda gazing intently into a shop window as though deciding whether the purchase of a black trilby was necessary at this crucial time.

"Magda?" Tilda received no response, the dilemma of the black trilby obviously more absorbing than previously supposed. "I think there's something we need to clear up."

_Had that been a flick of a glance in her direction through the reflecting properties of the glass they faced?_

"I won't have you treating me like fragile china any more. One thing I learnt in those painful first months alone out there in the country was that I was stronger than most of those that fluttered around me, stronger and more prepared against the world in many ways." Tilda noted that the Magda's reflection had turned away from her somewhat as she spoke, hands thrusting hard into deep pockets. "It's been a long time since I needed you to do everything for me." Tilda reached out to that stiff shoulder but let her hand drop before making contact. In the glass she caught the flash of eyes, Magda warily watching her every move.

"I've learnt to stand on my own two feet – it was a hard lesson, but I learnt to do it." She turned away from the window to face her friend. "Would you really take that away from me?"

"Sorry." The muttered apology carried no grace and Magda still wouldn't raise her gaze. Out of the corner of her eye Tilda could recognise in the glass that old expression locked into place, hiding the frustrated anger she knew was simmering underneath. She waited. Minutes passed and the bustling life of the street continued behind them as they stood on their tense little chunk of pavement before the hats on sale. Magda shifted from foot to foot, obviously struggling with something. However, when the words eventually came she didn't spit them out but spoke softly to the sturdy boots planted next to hers.

"You're right. I'm sorry. I'll try and remember." She shrugged and lifting her gaze with a wry twisted smile she met those understanding eyes across the reflection. Tilda smiled at her in the window, knocked the nearest shoulder with a closed fist, and drawing a line under the incident led the way on toward the bakery she could see on the corner.

Eventually, feet aching, they found a small coffee-shop tucked away down a dead-end alley and collapsed into the spindly chairs with sighs of relief. The place was busy and as they waited for the waitress to notice them Magda reached with barely hidden curiosity for the paper left on the nearby table. The headline caught her eye and she pushed the newsprint across the table to the one engineer sitting around this particular piece of furniture.

"Is this you?" The headline read "_Undertaking Underperforming_" a title that had caused the editor much pain before he allowed it to pass.

"Classified remember? Anyway it's my day off, I'm forbidden from talking about it, Janey would kill me."

"Janey?"

Tilda willingly broke into a description of her irreplaceable lab manager, the somewhat slanderous sketch fortunately interrupted by the waitress bringing them minuscule cups of thick dark coffee. Apparently everyone came in here to drink the coffee of home, even those who hadn't ordered it. Across the table they shared a surprised glance before the aroma rising from the impenetrable beverages persuaded them. Upon tasting the coffee it took only a minute for them to realise the liquid was undrinkably piping hot. As they sat waiting for it to cool the warmth of the room crept under their layers, causing Tilda to loosen her scarf and Magda to remove her gloves, placing them on top of the paper at her side.

"What's that?" Tilda pointed, careful this time not to make contact.

"Oh, I caught it on a chisel." Magda ran a finger over the healing cut on the back of her hand and a frustrated kick under the table persuaded her to continue the tale. "I started woodwork classes, they run them in the artisan's guild, a couple of evenings a week. I'm not so experienced with the tools yet, a bit clumsy. I guess it must have just slipped."

Tilda reached out, asking silently for a closer look and after a moments pause Magda placed her hand into the waiting palm. Tilting it to the light Tilda traced the wound delicately, examining the extent of the damage.

"You should have that bound up. Don't want it to get infected."

"It's ok. Anne... someone gave me some salve for it, it already looks better than it did."

"You'll be more careful next time?"

"I promise." She gently tugged back and Tilda had to release the hand she'd captured. They sipped the coffee, Tilda making a face at the bitter flavour.

"You always did have a way with wood. I remember you'd be sat there with that knife, whittling, always whittling. Night after night. You made some wonderful things." Another image dropped into her mind. _Tonker carving that bloody figure over and over again, the bottle at hand, always within reach, always open. The cold blankets a heavy weight pinning Tilda down as she pretended to be asleep, fear clawing at her insides as she watched Tonker watch the knife glinting in the half light._

Hearing the intake of breath she looked up to catch the shock dawn over the face opposite as Magda realised what it was that Tilda was remembering. "Oh gods, I'm sorry Mags." She reached out to recapture a hand but Magda withdrew her fingers, shrinking back into her chair. There was a tense silence while Magda sat there, pondering something and then, seeming to have come to a decision, she pulled herself back together and leant forward again, resting firm elbows on the table as she sipped at her coffee. She placed the cup deliberately between them before speaking.

"Seems there's some things we need to get clear here." Magda's voice was level but she couldn't disguise the unsteadiness of the fingertip she ran around the top of her cup. "First up, you don't get to apologise for stuff that wasn't your fault." Noting Tilda's slight confusion she added "you weren't the only one that had to learn some hard lessons these past years." Magda's eyes dropped again and she waited as the couple on the table nearest the window paid their bill and made their way out of the café before continuing. "Second, I aint never gonna be able to sit opposite you and pretend all that stuff never happened and I don't reckon I can do this again if that's what you thought you wanted."

"I didn't" The whisper was barely loud enough to reach across the table. Magda nodded.

"Right then." She took a sip from her coffee. "Of course that puts us somewhere up shit creek cos I have no idea how we're going to manage hauling all that around every time we say hello." She grinned wryly, fingers gently cradling the cup. "Damn stupid images keep cropping up all over the place since I bumped into you again. Guess it's not different for you huh?"

Tilda nodded.

"Maybe this wasn't such a good idea." Draining the last of her coffee, Magda ignored the hand still reaching out for hers as she pushed back her chair and hauled herself to her feet. "We should go. I have to go to work tonight, they're expecting me." Tilda frowned, knowing full well the coffee shop didn't open so late but before she could ask for clarification Magda produced the explanation. "I'm a pot and pan washer." Gritted pride kept her talking. "I managed to get some shifts at one of the Hagar's chain over on Elm Lane. The extra money comes in handy."

_For the night classes_, Tilda realised suddenly, understanding dawning as to what they represented to this complicated woman clawing her way back into society as best she knew how. Magda had always loved working with wood, having some kind of instinctive feel for the shape trapped within the grain and the best way to release it or if that were not possible to allude to its hidden beauty with simple strokes of her knife. But she had never talked about it, even when they had been so long out of _that place_ that even Tilda had come to see they were free. Never allowed herself to admit it was something that could be pursued. She had always worked at her poor scraps of wood dismissively, making out that it was just some way to pass the time, nothing she really cared about, nothing that she was proud to name as one of her skills. Seemingly more lessons had been learnt in those empty years than perhaps even Magda realised.

Tilda reached for her coffee, drinking it in one go and relishing the jolt as it raced down her gullet. Wrapping her scarf once again around her neck she followed Magda to the door, pausing before passing through to state quietly "I _can_ stand the memories, Mags. I meant what I said about fragile china. And I'm still crazy enough to think we can find our way through this."

They walked back in silence, but as she left the engineer on the shallow steps of the guild Magda hovered for a moment. "I hope things go better for you this week, I'll keep my fingers crossed." They shared a smile before Magda sketched a salute and disappeared into the dusk of the evening.

~X~

The second time Magda took her to The Shambling Gate and they climbed the 72 steps to lean on the parapet and gaze out over the city lain out before them in the afternoon sunset. A companionable silence fell between the two figures alone in that place between earth and sky. It seemed no other citizen had the energy or inclination to climb the dark stone staircase to impinge on their isolation. Picking absent-mindedly at the lichen that coated every visible surface, Tilda cast a glance at the still figure beside her.

"Janey asked me yesterday if I knew what I was doing." Magda froze for a moment and then carefully relaxed again, resettling against the parapet.

"Spending more time with you, that is."

"It's nice." Magda flicked the smallest flake of stone into the abyss. "She's worried about you. Rhijan keeps trying to take me to one side, check I'm not about to explode."

"Are you?" Tilda turned toward her companion warily, settling her hip against the wall. Beside her Magda stared out over the plains blurredly visible stretching away from the encircling city walls. Thin fingers searched along the flaking parapet, tidying the uneven stone, revealing unwittingly the mind behind those shielded eyes, hunting for the right words to clarify a most untidy situation.

"The things you make me remember were never the things I was running away from." The merest hint of a smile lifted the corner of the mouth just visible to Tilda's concerned gaze. But then, as she watched the smile twisted, Magda's tone developing an edge. "There's nothing left buried to jump out and surprise the unwary investigator. All dark secrets thoroughly exposed to the light." A short bitter laugh gusted out into the chill air, the woman's shoulders tight as she leant more heavily on the supporting wall.

"Fair enough." Tilda shifted back to look out over the city again, her gaze roving over the bustle of streets below. "Look – you can see the new _Undertaking_ line going in."

Magda grunted, following the line of her finger. "It's making a hell of a mess."

"You know what they say; you can't make an omelette without breaking eggs."

"Just cos you're breaking eggs don't mean we're all gonna end up with a tasty meal at the end the process."

Tilda grinned, pleased with the outcome of her distraction tactics. They stood for a moment in more cheerful silence.

"How did your egg breaking go this week then?"

"Urgh." Tilda slumped over the parapet. "Don't ask. Possible solution number 38 tested and found non-viable... Possible solution number 39 tested and found non-viable… Possible solution number 40 tested and found non-viable. You get the general drift."

"What's the problem?" Tilda threw her a look. "Ah, classified?"

"Classified."

"I got to use a lathe this week." Magda dropped the information into the pool of their conversation and stepped back to see its effect. Tilda, drawn out of her introspection glanced over, waiting curiously. Eventually, her interested gaze producing no visible effect she bumped the silent figure beside her for a renewal of the tale.

"They were teaching us about wood turning. I made a bat." Tilda began with congratulations to be interrupted with a dour "_eventually_".

"Oh." Tilda bit her lip. "How many?"

"Four." Magda nodded proudly. "Total disasters, every one."

"What did you do with the last one?"

"Got it behind the door." She shuffled her feet against the cold. "I can't decide what to do with it. D'you want it for your minions?"

"They're not minions." Tilda restated the contradiction mildly as beside her Magda snorted unrepentantly into her hands. "I may have to borrow it for the blasted prototype though. I swear that thing is possessed by a rogue spirit."

"Feel free, I expect they'll give us the chance to make more should your dratted machine decide to eat it." Magda straightened, drawing her jacket more firmly around her shoulders before returning to her resting position against the parapet. This movement inadvertently reminded Tilda of the difference in quality between their outer layers.

"We should go down, it's freezing up here. These hands are too important for the future transportation network of this city to lose any fingers to frostbite." She hauled herself off the parapet wishing a silent _au revoir_ to the city, its tangle of streets vanishing into the dusk as the filigree necklace of individual scattered specks of light began to stretch out its tendrils over the dark brooding mass below.

Pausing at the trapdoor that Magda held open graciously Tilda took one last look at the wide sky, painted in the unreal colours of a fading winter sunset. "This was a good idea." She put a gentle hand on the arm of the figure beside her in the gloom and added a quiet "thank you". Left behind on the rooftop Magda cast a glance round at the shabby exposed stone and shrugged before slipping through the gap and carefully closing the hatch behind her.

Once away from the distracting view both woman found themselves shivering uncontrollably in the dank chill of the stairwell. When they eventually emerged at street level both were more than willing to find a warm bolthole. However, despite the cold Magda baulked in the doorway of the pub across the street, unwilling to expose Tilda to those memories. In this she was overruled by her companion who was frozen to the bone and vocally adamant that she'd be damned if they were going to wander the streets until they found a warm place that didn't serve booze in some guise or other when there was one right there. As Tilda explained succinctly that Magda could ruddy well have a mulled tea and be grateful for it and dragged her in through the heavy door, Magda decided there was nothing for it but to acquiesce graciously.

They squeezed into a small corner and wrapping their hands round the piping hot mugs settled down to the pleasant process of warming up. A blazing fire roared in the inglenook and around it a cheerful set of students appeared to be enjoying that age old practice of discovering common music played in far off countries and finding it "deep". Currently they were carolling along to an old Lancre folk tune, though thankfully hedgehogs were not mentioned. The new arrivals subsided into their steaming mugs and attempted to block out the caterwauling.

Some time later, tipping her mug to get the last millimetre of liquid Magda came to the cosy conclusion that her toes were warm again. Life was good. She could even look with kindness on the students, now entered onto a Genuian ditty. Opposite Tilda pushed back her chair. "Another?"

Magda nodded and by the time Tilda came back with the mugs the students had finished their happy session. As Tilda settled into her seat they shared a relieved smile while around them the pub rejoiced at the blessed quiet. Able at last to talk Magda opened an enquiry about the recent election of guild council members and sat back to listen to Tilda talk.

Suddenly the flow of words dried up and catching Tilda's eyes across the table Magda knew she recognised the tune as well. The violinist, previously forced to play whatever the wassailers had demanded, was now free to pick out soft melodies, those his fingers remembered but that had never been fettered by being written down to mould away in empty libraries. He'd been drifting from phrase to phrase, snatches of this tune and that but seemed to have settled into a soulful melody, his eyes half closed as his fingers danced over the strings.

"Dammit, the old tunes get everywhere." Magda dropped her eyes to her drink.

"I don't think it's Borogravian… I remember this tune. An old man played it..." Tilda struggled against the mist, trying to grab the memory that fluttered so elusively. Across the table Magda frowned as the music continued, images dropping into her mind, stubble under her feet, the all pervasive scent of dried grasses, the tug of tired muscles resisting as tempting waves of sleep rolled up from the quiet deeps.

"The old man… in the barn, that summer."

Tilda's eyes cleared at Magda's words, the memory dropped into her mind, its detail as clear as the day she'd first heard the scraping of strings.

_They had come down from the hills to find the valley in the midst of its wheat harvest. They'd left Borogravia long months before, crossing the high mountains to lands where they were unknown and therefore presumably free. Despite this they had been unable to shed their intrinsic wariness of being seen or questioned and they'd originally planned to make their way straight down through the farmland at night without stopping. The village at the end of the valley was their next aiming point, offering as it did the chance to renew their provisions before the next stage of their secretive journey. But fate stepped in to lend a hand and that first night they slept too long in the field margin, huddling under the hedge. Awakening to the sound of industrious activity Magda had opened her eyes to squint through the swaying leaves at a mob of village folk stretched out across the field, making short work of cutting down the crop. She'd woken Tilda with a soft touch, whispering to calm her as she explained the situation._

_For hours they'd lain silent, watching the men and women working their way down the field. It was clear there would be no escape until the work was done, trapped as they were in the thickest part of the hedge they would be unable to move unobserved until the field was empty once more. Sure that they couldn't be spotted as long as they lay unmoving they'd turned their curious attention to the harvest folk in an attempt to pass the time. Such a mismatched collection of people they were as well, not just the farmer and associated family as they'd originally assumed. It seemed other refugees than them were making their way across country to some as yet undetermined destination. As the line wended past their hiding place they'd overheard two grizzled old men talking in the familiar language of home. Pricking up their ears they'd received the information that the folk of this valley were willing in times like this when labour available was less than needed, to welcome any pair of hands that could put in a days work without complaint for a copper or two and a solid meal at the end of the day._

_As was her job, being de facto leader of their expedition despite Tilda beginning at last to take an interest in life again, Magda began to form a plan. If these folk were willing to drop a copper or two in the hand of a wandering labourer without being inclined to closely question his origins she'd seen no reason not to take advantage of that. Tilda had originally been strongly against the idea, her fear of anyone other than Magda still crippling. But as the sun had crept across the azure blue sky she'd came round to the idea, eventually admitting that there wouldn't be any harm in giving it a go, they could always run should anyone take too great an interest in them._

_They'd presented themselves as two brothers, refugees from the ever present war that threatened to roll over their country once again. They would have preferred to avoid any reference to Borogravia at all, but they couldn't disguise their accent or the difficulty they had stumbling though the dialect their employers spoke. That saved them however, restricting conversation to hand gestures and short commands, no need to tell their made up tale as there were few that would understand it._

_They'd pushed their way down the valley with the rest of the itinerant workers, moving from farm to farm as they became more skilled in the swinging of a scythe and the gathering of the cut sheaves. No one questioned their relationship, the general attitude being to leave the uncommunicative alone as long as they put their days work in, there being more garrulous folk to fill up the gaps in conversation._

_It was at the harvest supper the valley had thrown on the last night where they'd heard the fiddler. Apparently it was traditional. Every year at the end of the gathering-in, the last farm, the largest one at the lower end of the valley where the soils were most fertile, put on a feast and knees-up for everyone remotely associated with the harvest. There had been cider, a large ham, a table groaning beneath a multitude of varying pies, and a band – in the form of a fiddler, reedy flute player and little drummer boy whose feet didn't yet touch the floor as he sat swinging his legs on a box._

_People had laughed and danced and ate and danced some more._

_The two brothers from Borogravia in their tattered clothes with their quiet shuttered eyes sat away from the noise in a protected corner, watching the revelry in with occasional puzzlement. Around them lay the evidence of their meal, crumbs and apple cores, still half full mugs of last years cider clasped between work worn hands. A farmer's daughter had asked Magda to dance, but she'd managed to refuse politely enough, feeling the tension ease out of the dark figure beside her as they watched the girl walk away. Even if Tilda was able to be left alone Magda didn't really want to dance. It looked complicated, the interaction between men and women appearing so simple to them as they moved to the music, but a foreign language to her._

_But the music had been pleasant. The lively tunes that had set their feet tapping, birthing a desire in Magda to dance, whether she could or not, just to let the music move through her and take her where it will. And then there were the slower melodies that the fiddler drew from his instrument when the dancers drew aside to rest. Beautiful soaring melodic lines and achingly painful deep jagged refrains that pulled open old wounds in the two silent listeners hidden in the corner, hurting and in the same moment applying balm to wounded spirits with those simple harmonies._

_They'd sat there until late in the evening whilst one family after another wended their way homeward through the dusk. They'd been allocated sleeping space in the hayloft and the soft sweet smelling grasses were a siren call for tired muscles, but they sat on, watching couples dancing in slow circles below the soft light of the lanterns. It was just when Magda was wondering if she could slip an arm around Tilda's shoulders without anyone noticing that the farmer's wife slipped into their corner, startling them out of their dreams. She'd offered a small earthware pot filled with some kind of salve, explaining with simple gestures that it was to be rubbed into muscles, to ease the tightening. Reaching out to take it Magda's other hand had slipped unconsciously to her shoulder, kneading gently at the knot there. Ever since the Fathers had put her shoulder out of joint that one time she'd had trouble after heavy exercise. The woman had smiled at them, nodded and slipped away. As Magda had sat there processing this new information Tilda had picked the pot out of her hand, sniffing interestedly at its contents. She'd stood, purpose in her movement and stretching back for Magda's hand had tugged her away, the two girls walking hand in hand across the farmyard – leaving the lighted barn behind them._

_It took a moment for their eyesight to adjust to the darkness of the cattleshed. Scrabbling blind towards the ladder Magda had bumped into a soft yielding figure that giggled in the quiet. She'd attempted to grab for the tease, but off balance from the cider had instead stumbled into the door of a loosebox. The giggle again rang out in the darkness. Feeling her way with hands outstretched towards the source of that giggle Magda found her hands held in a strong clasp and guided to the ladder up to the hayloft._

_Enveloped in the scent of sweet grasses, the two girls had lain back amongst the prickly bedding waiting for the unsteadying effects of the cider to retreat. Her night vision growing Magda had turned to the figure she could now pick out as darker against the background gloom._

"_You'm a little minx."_

_The figure had giggled again. A beautiful sound to one who had held on through those dark days when it was uncertain if Tilda would ever even take notice of the world again, never mind smile. Magda had been exhausted, her whole body one large ache, previously unused muscles screaming out at the treatment they'd been forced into, but it had been a great summer. She'd relaxed back into the softness, stretching out with a sigh. Beside her she felt the change in the slope of the hay as Tilda sat up._

"_Give us your shoulder."_

_Magda had rolled away, sitting up to pull the ragged shirt over her head, the pull in her shoulder causing her to wince and hiss between her teeth. She'd felt the cool touch of hands against her skin, Tilda's fingertips wandering gentle to find the knot before smoothing the salve over the tight muscle. The gentle fingers had turned firm, rubbing in the balm with small probing circles and Magda had leant back against the pressure, the undoing opening up down her back, her head drooping in sudden relaxation. The fingers had moved wider, moving out across her back, loosening old tensions in her neck, slipping down to drive strong thumbs under her shoulder blades. She'd been caught out unexpectedly in a yawn, stretching away from the wandering hands before returning willingly to their realm._

_It had happened so simply, those light fingers drifting almost unconsciously from searching out knots in muscle to cautious exploration. Aware suddenly that soft fingers were soothing their way up her side and tracing along her spine Magda had turned in surprise to catch darkling eyes that spoke to her of times long past and needs un-named._

_The first kiss had been all gentleness, a slow exploration or territory once well known but not trod for many months now. Magda had pulled back – searching those dark eyes, needing to know that this __**was**__ what Tilda wanted, that she was present, all of her, needing to be sure. Even with that evidence staring her in the face she had been all tenderness, so slowly unwrapping the fragile girl, exploring hands soothing over soft skin, tasting, always a light touch, hesitating at every breath of response._

"_Tell me if it's too much." And the soft laughter she'd been given in reply had been a gift beyond price as Tilda ambushed her, pressing her back into the soft piles of cushioning grass._

_They'd taken their time, up there amongst the sweet hay, privacy ensured by the party still on-going in the barn across the way. The music had drifted in and wended its way into their love-making, Tilda murmuring a repeated chorus quietly into responsive skin as she traced her way along sharply relieved bones._

_That had been the beginning of the good times. The times before a secret buried darkness clawed its way into Magda's nightmares and started her onto the path of destroying everything they had managed to build together. That night Tilda hadn't had the dreams. She'd slept right through, a calm smile solidly stable on her face whenever Magda, prickled into wakefulness by hay against bare skin, looked down to check her slumber. It was the first night of many that she slept through. And the first night of many that Magda didn't. Back then, as she lay curled around the quietly sleeping figure, she'd had no inkling of the turmoil that was bearing down on them from a distant horizon._

"I can still taste that cider."

Magda blinked, the smoke darkened walls of the pub coming back into focus. The fiddler had just lifted the bow from the strings, bowing to the smattering of applause. He broke immediately into a lively ditty, Ankh Morporkian in origin judging by the lusty singing that sprung up from the straggle of long term drinkers at the bar.

"It was good cider." Magda buried her nose into her mug, the tea not precisely cold, but no longer warming. Across the table she thought she could pick out a faint blush staining Ms Tewt's pale cheeks. Seemingly she wasn't the only one that remembered certain parts of that evening with perfect clarity. Magda's lips twitched momentarily as she raised her cup, refining her earlier her statement for greater emphasis.

"It was _great_ cider." And Tilda had raised her cup to clink the two together gently.

Later that evening the figure of Magda Halter wandered the cold streets alone, her feet having carried her automatically away from the guild. The wind was cruel and there were any number of warmer places to be but she kept walking even as ugly memories that had merely lain hidden beneath the surface that beautiful untainted summer night raised familiar heads. As she wended her way from one quiet alley to another Magda watched dispassionately as the darkness attempted to swell forward from the back recesses of her mind. Such a vigorous stirring of the pot had been bound to bring forth consequences but despite everything she refused to regret a moment of the day. She'd meant it when she'd said that the images Tilda brought back were not something she would run from. For all it had been an arduous struggle to sort through the unpleasant rubble left over from those years the deed was done and the shadows didn't frighten her any more.

Yet for all her determination there remained the sour taste in her mouth, a taste she knew would linger, the familiar acrid tang only one flavour could wash away. But before the thought crossed her mind she put it to one side. The price remained prohibitively high and making a sudden decision she changed her direction and began to walk with purpose in her step. There was a meeting tonight and though she hadn't attended for a while there would be no harm in dropping by to alleviate the boredom with her presence.

An hour or so later and as she was walking the same streets again no longer alone but with Rhi striding along at her side. They were talking of this and that, a smattering of those inconsequential things that make life worth living. This evening it was the new dwarf who had started at Rhi's office and in whom she was somewhat interested if a little uncertain. Leaving her companion at a busy crossroads Magda walked on, picking her way through the patches of ice left here and there to snare the unwary. A song drifted up through the mist and she quickened her pace, the call of her bed strong after a long day. Fumbling her key as she attempted to quietly manipulate the lock she found herself caught up in a massive yawn but the smile that crept over her lips as she silently closed the door behind her stayed as she crept up the stairs. Stretching out under chill sheets only moments later Magda let the memories wash over her, the warmth of those harvest days spreading out through tired muscles in relaxing waves. But before she could join more than a few images together in jerky display she dropped into soft dreamless sleep.


	4. Eating and Drinking

**Chapter 3: Eating and Drinking**

Tilda had scurried along the corridor but as she reached the head of the wide staircase the imposing décor had an unconscious effect on her pace and she slowed to process in a more majestic fashion down toward the foyer. Pausing as the view opened out before her she frowned. Magda was pacing again. With a swift glance at the big old clock the engineer realised she was late (again) and took the remainder of the stairs two at a time. Tilda had always been light on her feet but even so Magda looked up as she began her rapid descent. Admittedly the woman had probably glanced up at every footstep on those marble steps, but that didn't make it any the less cheering to see her gaze lift and the relieved smile spread over that usual controlled face. An answering smile lit up Tilda's eyes as she crossed the foyer to briefly clasp gloved hands.

"Finally!" Withdrawing her hands and returning them to her pockets Magda hovered impatiently as Tilda began to wind her scarf about her neck. "The security guard was looking at me funny."

"Well, you were probably looking at him funny." Tilda adjusted her scarf a little tighter over her face before employing nimble fingers to button her coat up to the neck.

"I was just _waiting_. Patiently. For a long time. A _very_ long time." Someone was apparently a little hungry and thus inclined to hold a grudge.

"Mumff mro"

"What?"

Tilda pulled down the scarf allowing her to enunciate more clearly the words "let's go" and Magda evidently agreed as she led the way briskly out into the city that sat huddled in below-freezing temperatures despite the valiant attempts of the thin midday sun.

"Where shall we go today? Dibbler's baked potato cart? I hear he's got a new chilli recipe..." The voices faded away into the hubbub of the ever present Ankh Morporkian crowd.

It was more than half an hour later that the pair wandered back into the foyer. The guard, observing them without curiosity over his perusal of the back pages of the AM Times, noted the clatter of their boots on the polished marble. Ms Tewt's companion seemed to be in a hurry to get back to work as usual. He watched their conversation casually there being little else to attract his attention. The companion turned to go but Tewt (who had begun to smile at him recently as she passed by in the mornings) grabbed the woman's arm and began to drag in his direction.

"Let me at least introduce you to Sidney, that way he'll know you the next time you come by." The woman protested but after checking the large ornate clock that hung impossibly between the staircases she shrugged and allowed herself to be tugged toward the reception desk.

The solidly-built bald-headed gentleman behind the desk watched them approach. As training dictated he was building a mental picture of the slim figure accompanying Ms Tewt for future reference. In 'additional comments' he added a coat somewhat too thin for the time of year, unbuttoned in the comparative warmth of the cavernous entrance hall to reveal hints of a low quality but non-the-less well-cut dark breeches and matching waistcoat. A sensible face, solid chin, straight nose, grey eyes, no distinguishing features. His note-taking gaze continued upward, finishing on burnished red hair caught tidily at the nape of the neck as was the current fashion in a thin leather strap with a few unruly strands falling around a closed face, probably loosened when the woollen cap that was tightly clasped in one hand had been removed upon entering the building. "_Ginger"_ as he'd been calling Ms Tewt's companion for the past month was a familiar sight to all the desk staff at the Guild and was currently filed under "nervy, but not a threat" in his cabinet of unclassified persons.

"Sidney, this is my good friend, Ms Halter. You may have seen her around." The guard remained stoically silent behind his wooden shield but Tilda continued undeterred. "Magda, this is Sidney, protector of the greatest brains on the disc." Ms Halter mirrored his solid expression and did not speak. Again, conscious of the required etiquette, Tilda persisted. "I was just saying to Mags that it was about time you two got to know each other, what with all the time she has to spend hanging around waiting for me." Tilda paused for the laugh but quickly realising she was to be unrewarded for her quip instead drew the conversation to a close on a hope that the two would soon be best of friends.

Keeping their perfectly identical non-expressions the two members of the conversation that hadn't yet spoken nodded at each other politely and then turned away to separately purge the awkward moment from their day.

"And now for the tour."

"The tour?" Magda turned startled eyes to her companion.

"Come on," Tilda was walking backward away from her with what could only be called a pleading pout. "You don't have to be back for a while. Let me show you around."

"I thought you were busy?" Magda was tempted despite herself. "You _said_ you were late for lunch because you were in the middle of something."

"I think I can make time." Tilda grinned, watching as her victim visibly wavered. "Come on, we can call it payment for my making you wait."

Magda had watched Tilda appear and disappear at the top of that imposing flight of stairs for a good number of weeks now and had built up an natural store of curiosity as to what was hidden up there, behind the Guild's imposing frontage. After all, she didn't have to be back at the café for another twenty minutes and she could always run. Or be a bit late. From the foyer she had caught the merest glimpse of some kind of carving just out of sight and it had been a long repressed desire to see it in full. Magda shrugged and shaking her head at her inability to resist temptation she followed on.

Sidney watched them go from behind his desk. The companion turned with her foot on the first step to catch his watchful gaze and frowned momentarily. But when he merely nodded at her and pretended to return his attention to the clipboard in of him he saw the relaxation of tight shoulders out of the corner of his eye. She caught up with Ms Tewt with a few quick steps and he made a note to add "fragile" to her dossier.

"So, do I get to see everything? Even that demon possessed model you're designing?" Magda caught up with the engineer half way up the stairs and Tilda broke into a laugh.

"I think the blasted thing might actually be working at last." She urged Magda on with a fleeting hand under the elbow. "It was the vibrations, they built up into a full oscillation and we got a reverse in the flow that completely collapsed the cylindrical structure, dissipating all the force into the model, hence the _floggle-toggle_ expansion beyond recommended limits." They reached the head of the stairs and the engineer continued on, lost in her explanation and gesticulating fluently as she went. "It was the 42nd possible solution, we stumbled across it quite by accident. Minor imperfections in the direction planes. You have no idea how relieved I was. It's not going to be easy to fix, but at least we have a handle on the problem now."

Tilda abruptly realised she was talking to thin air and spun round to find the corridor behind her empty of anyone including Magda. Retracing her steps she found her lost audience standing in contented silence before the intricately oak carved representation of the rise of geometry and the birth of architecture.

"You like our _Mouseon_?"

"It's fitting." Magda seemed unwilling to say more but as she allowed herself to be dragged away she kept looking back over her shoulder until they turned a corner and the foyer was lost to view.

Fifteen minutes passed before the pair of figures appeared back at the head of the stairs. Those minutes heralded the end of the busy lunch period and it was a quieter emptier foyer that lay below their eyes as they paused for a moment on the balcony. Leaning there Tilda realised her mouth was dry from all the talking but she was able to bear this with the comfort that the tour had gone well. Her companion had said little but by the quick movement of her eyes shehad seemed to take everything in as Tilda had guided her along long corridors, up and down stairs and in and out of an encyclopedic number of different rooms. Nervous at the reception her new sanctuary would receive she had carried the tour along on a stream of extraneous facts and figures, unable to control the un-needed chatter. It hadn't seemed to have affected the experience for her guest however, Magda allowing the torrent to flow over her without comment.

Now, the tour complete and the starting point once again obtained, Tilda found she couldn't think of anything to say. Instead they watched the passing of an errand boy in the foyer below as the silence thickened around them. He vanished through a hidden door and they heard the repeated flap of the door as it swung behind him, the frequency shortening and shortening until it closed and there was quiet once more.

"Next week then?" Tilda had had to break the silence, it was growing to suffocating levels.

Magda nodded, thanked her quietly for the tour and walked away down the stairs without looking back. The moving figure paused for a moment at the bottom of the stairs but it was only a brief second of hesitation before continuing on across the polished marble. From behind his forbidding desk Sidney tracked her path and as though sensing his eyes on her Magda glanced over as she passed. Tilda, following that steady progress from on high, noted the slight movement of the head and held her breath in sudden worry but the woman and guard did no more than share a brief nod. Halting before the imposing outer doors Magda pulled up the collar of her coat before shouldering her way through the doors and disappearing from sight.

Sidney looked up to where Tilda stood on the upper balcony and she sketched a wave. He made to get up but accepted her dismissive shake of the head and returned his attention to his work. She stayed on however, looking down at that empty marble foyer for a while longer.

When she returned at last to her office Tilda frowned at the mess on her desk. The dratted minions (she had forgotten when exactly it was she had started using Magda's term for them) persisted in randomly dumping things that required her attention on its welcoming surface. She had posted memos explaining, cajoling and finally forbidding but they continued. As she began to sort the mingled confusion of reports and altered blueprints into relevant piles her thoughts drifted traitorously back to the subject of the recent developments. Magda was back. Actually, if one were being scrupulously accurate it would be more correct to say that Tilda was back, Magda having never actually left. But it was difficult to look at it that way. Tilda, looking back at her life unrolling in a long undulating path, saw Magda coming alongside, journeying with her for a time before striking off on her own path, leaving Tilda to walk the road alone.

Tilda knew the woman hadn't meant to twist their paths together again. Magda had been courteous and reserved from the start, more than willing to keep their paths separate. And yet here they were. Intertwined once more. They had lunch together, they explored the city together and Tilda had begun to build up a regular coffee habit, calling into Magda's café a couple of times a week.

How had they got from there to here? It had been so slow, so gradual. Their paths, driven by each to run no closer than side by side for a few ordered leagues had imperceptibly overlapped and grown into each other until an unknowing outsider might almost call them friends.

A noise in the outer office distracted her and Tilda glanced up from the massive drawing she was wrestling with to find Janey hovering in the doorway. Bloody meetings. She sighed, nodded and, grabbing a pad of paper and the essential pencils, trailed after her technician. Deep and meaningful pondering on the possible future of old but painfully re-discovered friendships would have to wait until another day.

~X~

Some weeks later the weather hadn't improved. A cold winter rain splattered intermittently against the window pane but was ignored by the room's only occupant who was steadily editing a complicated diagram, her concentration fully on her work. Tilda allowed herself a small smile of satisfaction as she folded the document and returned it to the requisite folder. The quiet of the empty guild extended out from where she sat, spreading through the long room outside with the empty rows of desks usually bustling with draughtsmen and engineers and out along the deserted corridors. Outside the window the rain had been falling all morning in solid sheets from heavy bulging clouds but inside the steady light from the lamp placed perfectly 'just so' on her desk surrounded her in a pool of light.

A thin pale blue folder was next and the engineer stared at it in surprise. It was more ornate than the usual utilitarian files that travelled around the guild from office to office. The crest on the front declared it had arrived from the alchemist guild and turning the first few pages she sighed. Ever since they'd successfully tested the prototype and begun the first field installation everyone had been eager to get a piece of the pie. Tilda put the file to one side with a frown, preferring to spend her short allocation of peace and quiet on the simpler problems associated with the varying structural pressures needing to be circumvented in the protection of a fragile cylinder driven recklessly through a matrix of widely differing bedrock.

The room fell silent apart from the occasional scratching of her pen and all was peace for about twenty minutes until the diligent worker was struck by a sudden idea regarding alchemists and their incomprehensible problems. Ferreting through the piles for the slim file Tilda was about to make her way off into the bowels of the building when she recalled that Ferric wasn't in this weekend. Calling down a curse mechanical proportions on all Dwarfs she slumped back into her chair. She would have to write a note. Pondering the best way to say it Tilda decided in the end to merely write a enticingly worded request for his presence in her office. Hopefully he would think she had cake and come as soon as he could on Monday morning. Dropping the note into her out tray she made a mental note to place it predominantly on his desk on her way out of the building.

With her train of thought thus interrupted Tilda put her pencil to one side and reached for her mug of tea. Leaning back in her chair she allowed herself a moment to think. The paperwork that lay sorted into neat piles on the table before her stood as positive evidence of a successful few hours. It was guild official policy that no-one worked at the weekend, those lucky (or odd) enough to have families spending the precious few days with them while the students used the time to drink themselves into oblivion, play sports (badly) and invent ingenious experiments in the ways of all students everywhere. A few hardy souls ignored this ruling however, the chill of an unfriendly boarding house driving them back to the arms of the guild. Tilda was one of these, an inveterate weekend worker, relishing the quiet as a chance to get to grips with the mountains of paperwork she was forced to ignore during the week.

Today had been no different and she'd felt her heart sink as she unlocked the office door to meet the sight of the mountains of files laid out on her desk. Some malicious spirit had been in action and the towering paper had not only grown but also collapsed in on itself from what she was sure had been neat piles when she'd left on Friday. How could so much havoc be created inside a locked office in just one day? It merited study. If she weren't already so busy.

Faced with a desk of confusion whilst still only halfway down her first cup of coffee of the day Tilda had almost turned and fled. It was a great temptation just to lock the door on it again and pretend she'd never been. But she was a chief engineer now and had responsibilities. She had bolstered her spirits, reminded herself that she had a nice long period of quiet to really get her teeth into them, and shrugged determinedly out of her coat**[1]**.

* * *

**[1]**Her attire was perhaps a little smart for a weekend but she had always found that her important looking suit with narrow skirt and well cut waistcoat in mid grey somehow improved her efficiency levels when paperwork was involved. Oddly its powers also extended to meetings and the outfit had garnered quite a reputation within the Guild.

* * *

Looking at the now ordered piles ("_Done_" "_To Do_" "_Ask Janey_" and "_Bloody Impossible_") Tilda allowed a small flicker of pride to lift the corners of her mouth. She stretched in the chair, easing a back cramped from sitting awkwardly and ran her hand through untidy short hair, making a mental note that she needed to get it cut again. She hated it too long. Her mind drifted for a moment to her calender as she pondered when exactly she might find time for a haircut but her brain had been throwing up distractions in this manner all morning and she sternly forced herself to put down her tea cup and get back to the matter in hand. The size of her "_To Do_" pile was still too large for comfort.

Time dragged on. Tilda, struggling against a late morning slump, watched as a pen rolled down a pile of papers and clattered noisily to the floor. The sound was oddly loud in the silence of the guild. All those empty offices. She was a one woman treadmill of industry in a big empty hive. It wasn't only the guild that was deserted, the empty offices in the buildings around her added to the oppressive quiet. All those architects, lawyers, solicitors, accountants relaxing somewhere out there. Ankh Morpork had really gone in for the concept of the weekend in recent years, the streets in the business district desolated, their heartbeat of regular commuters halted.

Going to the window she gazed down out at the empty city scape. Her office was tucked away around the side of the guild and overlooked a quiet street. It was completely deserted, nothing there to tether her wandering thoughts. Idly she noticed that the wind had got up and would be driving the rain into the faces of any persistent pedestrian daring to brave the weather. Somewhere out there Magda was working, selling coffee to those taking a break from the rain or driven to escape whatever waited for them back home. The café opened on Sundays despite the emptiness of the district and Magda would be there, working quickly and efficiently as she served the few in between the more mundane tasks of preparing for the week ahead.

Drawing distractedly on the pane with one finger Tilda considered whether she should sneak off to the café for lunch. A break might be just what she needed. Of course she had brought some food, but the temptation of a freshly brewed cup of coffee tugged strongly at her bored mind. They would have a copy of the paper too. Tilda smiled, ever since she'd bumped into Fredricks, Magda's regular with a crossword obsession, they'd had a friendly competition going as to who could fill out the _AM Times_ Sunday Crossword the fastest. Honours were equally divided and if Tilda could make the time she could often be found making use of the Sunday afternoon quiet of the café to get to grips with 7-down as Magda cleaned up the accumulated mess of the week around her.

A handful of rain thrown against the window with irritated vigour drew her out of her pleasant introspection. No. Not today. Tilda was more than willing to brave the mean streets but there was a complication involved with visiting the café too often. She recalled all too clearly how the eyes that met hers over the counter had used to soften into simple happiness when they saw her. They were wary now, Magda reserved where before she had been relaxed. It had used to be that when they were alone together they were free. Now there were only awkward silences, full of questions both were unwilling or unable to ask. Where was the old Magda of their childhood who had allowed the reciprocal bonds of their friendship despite her self reliance? Tilda missed that girl, the girl who was at ease in her company. Was that relationship lost forever? Had the fact that she'd left ruined it all?

Looking back it was hard to remember that time. Difficult to see through the smoke in her mind to what had made walk out all those years ago. The fire had been burning she knew that. The fire had burnt a lot back then. Magda had been angrier than usual, drunk of course and struggling with her own demons. The atmosphere had been poisonous, their sanctuary sullied, and against that backdrop Tilda had been wrestling with her own fear and that burning constant need.

_She hadn't been able to think. _Even now Tilda knew she hadn't been considering running away. She'd just walked out, the decision happening without any conscious thought.

The street scene below faded as her mind was flung back over the years. The circumstances of how she'd become a member of the guild were still not entirely clear. Enshrouded in the thin mist of a struggling fire her memories of that time lay unexplored. It wasn't that she had never viewed them, over the years they had snapped back unbidden, like so many others she couldn't control. Flashes of incomplete scenes she could never quite catch the detail of as they flew past. Now, as Tilda allowed the memories to unfurl she could see clearly for the first time how much was missing.

_She'd followed him through the streets of Ankh Morpork, she knew that much. _Later she had learnt that he'd been a senior member of the Guild but all she'd known on that terrible day was that his robes released the familiar scent of chemicals as he walked purposefully past and she'd followed him.

Thinking back, not many days could have passed since she'd walked out of that small attic and everything it contained. She'd been hungry, she remembered that much. But then they'd been hungry often those last few weeks, what with Magda spending most of her wages on that bottle at her elbow. Tilda didn't remember that she'd been cold despite the weather, so her clothes and shoes must have still been in reasonable condition. This was how she had to calculate time, extrapolating from flashes of emotion that even now flickered and died when she tried to examine them. In a sudden moment of clarity she saw herself, lost, stumbling through the streets and alleyways of an area of Ankh Morpork, no clear destination in mind. It was as she'd been crouching in a welcoming doorway that she'd first caught the faint whiff of explosives as he passed, the niggling need at the back of her mind flaring into sudden life.

_Here was what she needed. Here was what she craved._

_Fire_. _Her fire. A leaping hungry blaze that would sweep through this ugly broken world and wipe everything clean_. The need had clawed at her, an almost physical ache. She'd crept along in his wake, the burgeoning plans expanding and spreading on hot tendrils through her mind but the spitting fuse had run headlong into the harsh solidity of the law.

_She mustn't set fire. It upset Magda._

_But Magda left us_, the persistent crackling reminded her. _Magda hates us, hates the sight of us, can't even bear to look at us. Magda is gone._

_Mustn't set fire. _ In her memory the man turns a corner in the distance. She has fallen behind, drifting to the side of the street as the argument rages. _Mustn't Set Fire. It makes Magda frightened. We don't hurt Magda, she is our friend, she looks after us._

But Magda was gone.

Gone. _Into the bottle, into the shadows, slipped away into the darkness where Tilda should have followed, should have helped, but couldn't. Down there were things. Shapes Tilda knew and recognised. Things she could remember if only she let herself look back. She could see the vague outlines of them, sluggishly moving in the depths. She couldn't bear to go down there again. _

She should have. Tilda knew that now as she had known then. Magda had needed her. Madga had asked. But she simply couldn't.

_Magda left us_, the flames had whispered again. _Left us to wander off into places no-one should go. Magda __**knew**__ that the darkness hurts us but she went there anyway. She left __**us**__. We should show her. We'll make the biggest explosion the city has ever seen, vaporise the stinking mouldy thatch, send tiles flying through the air, wipe away all these higgledy-piggldy too-many too-close piled-up squeezed-together rat-holes on an enormous tower of billowing flame. _

She had been able to see it in her mind's eye.

_When we are done there will be left only ash for the breeze to carry away over the fields. We will scour the city clean until nothing is left but the bare bones and then we will walk tall through empty streets in the blessed silence._

_**That will show her.**_

_No. We don't set fire. It upsets Magda. _It was all she had had to hold onto.

He'd turned back, that man that smelt of chemicals, that coincidence that she'd stumbled across in the street. He'd come back past her as she huddled on a low bollard, turned into a hidden alleyway beside her and she'd faintly heard the jingle of a shop door. That was that then. Tilda had sat on, fighting the flames. It was an old familiar battle, but that hadn't made it any easier to win. Surfacing in the present she remembered well the agonising pull of that long ago time, even now augmented by more recent battles.

Magda had always made sure there was the candle. Tilda, resting her forehead against the welcome chill of the window pane felt her hand tighten reflexively around the small box of matches deep in her pocket. She remembered how Magda had never spoken a word, simply kept a watch on the small shelf that held the slowly shortening stub and the precious box. Every now and then she would come back with a small parcel and place a fresh white length next to the minuscule scrap that remained. All those long months after they had come down from the high forest when Tilda couldn't go out. The weeks when she wouldn't go out, those days when she could, but never amongst people, never into the market place where they sold such things.

For over a year the candle had sat on a variety of shelves in a multitude of tiny cramped rooms. Ready for when she needed it. Waiting for the days when the wheel turned back into darkness and she lost sight of the way back into the light. Magda had always made sure. They'd used tapers for everything else, squinting in the poor light to mend tattered clothes. Good candles were expensive and Magda had been adamant that the money had to last. That they needed to keep some back for "emergencies".

Adrift again in her memories Tilda found herself back in that empty street, sat on that cold stone. She had left the candle behind. She could see it now, sitting on that small shelf, just a tiny stub. She'd been rationing it. Saving it because there might not be a replacement this time. Magda had gone and the woman that remained might not remember something as small and as silly as a candle. That little stub mocked her across the damp roofs. She had no candle. She had no matches. She was alone. Magda had left her. She had left Magda.

She had no matches.

It was as her thoughts were dropping into a whirling maelstrom of fire that the man had walked past her again. She'd got to her feet and followed him. There was no conscious decision involved, this Tilda, who had walked away from her only anchor, gave up, gave in and let the fire take over. _Let the door be closed on the memory of Magda's face, on that pleading outstretched hand. Let only the rage burn on a strong flame. Rage against Magda for not being there for her, rage at her lover for allowing her soul to be swallowed up by the nightmares and the anger and the drink and that bloody knife, at her friend for not being strong enough to withstand the darkness. Let only the rage live._

Trailing along behind that hurrying figure Tilda hadn't noticed the Guild as they slipped into its shadow, the imposing edifice of architectural boasting a mere blur to her. She'd followed him down a side alley entering the guild through a smaller, more everyday door. _Corridors_. She remembered corridors, smooth under her feet, empty. _Rooms_, large and small, beckoning her through half opened doors or glimpsed through dusty windows. Long benches, glassware, the odd lecture theatre. _Everything empty_. The robes had vanished through a door and she'd followed, finding a room filled with long benches and lined with glass fronted cabinets, each one filled with an array of bottles. A veritable treasure trove of explosive materials. Bottle after bottle had beckoned her enticingly and all at once her mind had burst into flame. Back in the present Tilda swallowed, the after-taste of her mug of tea superseded by the memory of that anticipation, the taste of iron on her tongue.

Alone in that room it had only taken her a minute to pick the lock on the nearest cabinet and she was walking trembling fingers along the labels typed so handily along the edge of the shelf when the intake of breath came from behind her. Here the clarity faded once again from her memories. He talked to her, she knew that. She'd had conversations with him later that had filled in some details but even now it was all overlain with her own turbulent emotions.

He apparently asked her about the bottle she had held clasped to her chest. She had selected it on reflex, knowing that if thrown correctly it would flay the skin from his face. She did not tell him that. When re-telling the tale he always laughs at this point before going on to tell how she gave him a word perfect description of how one could mix it with various other chemicals in the cupboard before her to produce "_an explosion of ten times the magnitude of the individual components. And a bad smell." _ She doesn't laugh when he tells the tale. The memory his words bring back is not that of facing him in that room. It is of another man. Standing there in her safe office Tilda remembered again the time she first discovered what that chemical could do. _The look the bastard would always get on his face as he reached out an eager hand to cup her cheek and run the rough pad of his thumb along her lip._ She took a deep breath and waited as the memory took its time to fade back into the past.

She has one other memory of that room with the bottles. When he tells the story he says that they talked for a long time, about this explosive and that, about how some should never be mixed together and yet others could be improved by the addition of a third component. She has no recollection of this. Her memory comes later. The way he tells it, it is the moment she got her job. All she remembers is that he asked her whether she could open a door of an estimated thickness (he held his hands apart to indicate the dimensions) with the things before them in the cupboard.

"_No. They're not strong enough. Your ears hurt and your nose bleeds but you still can't get out." _ _Memories come back with a rush._

He asked her if she would use something else. Taking her bottle with her she began to explore the other cabinets. She tried to push the crippling memory back with new information, focusing her attention on bottle after bottle. It worked in a fashion as irritation rose in its place. He did not have the chemical she was looking for. She remembers expressing her frustration while he pretended not to understand. Tilda recalled how, riding high on the nausea as it mixed with the fire in her brain, she gave him a full and detailed explanation of what she had in mind, including how with the alteration of ratios it was possible to theoretically control the end result to a precise degree. He let her use the chalk to show what she meant and even now she can remember how he stared for a long time at her equations.

The rest of the meeting is only stored as mumbled conversations between faint misty figures. Straining her memory Tilda caught something more as the smoke cleared for a moment letting her hear. A job was offered. A lab, outside of the city somewhere peaceful and quiet and all the chemicals she could want. She'd taken the bottle with her. They'd not asked. It had sat for years in her laboratory unopened.

She'd arrived to the feather-light spring leaves of that beautiful estate. They'd kept their promise, that committee whom the man had persuaded to take a chance on her. She'd got her lovely empty lab with the windows along the long wall looking out over carefully tended gardens. They'd given her time and space and allowed her to experiment. Over time she had got to know the other geniuses who had found a home at the Engineering Guild's Field Unit, each one grateful beyond measure for the sanctuary.

There she had stayed, isolated from the world and the world itself forgotten. There she had stayed until circumstances moved to uproot her and drop her back into Ankh Morpork. Back into the life she had left behind. Back to Magda. She had returned to generous gifts, companionable moments that reminded her of what she had lost but also to awkward conversations, painful silences and polite withdrawals. Was it worth all this harrowing over of old buried memories? Were she and Magda moving toward some distant destination where things were easier? Were they getting anywhere at all?

It was a question she'd returned to again and again but as yet found no answer. The view from the window paled as Tilda recalled the more prosaic reason that she'd come in this weekend. Damn, she hated all the bloody reports the guild wanted, update reports, progress reports, reports on new trainees, reports on personal problems. She wondered sometimes if she'd achieved her current position due to her ability to annotate a diagram or for her neat documentation. Sliding into her chair she groaned at the size of the pile still be processed. Gritting her teeth in dogged determination she took the cap off her pen and pulled another file toward her.

_Potential uses of Prototype EM4279..._

Her hand moved quickly over the paper, words flowing easily from her pen. She scribbled a quick diagram of her intent and moved onto the next paragraph.

In the quiet office on the second floor of the Guild time dragged on. Hours later Tilda signed the final page of a file, scribbled another address at the bottom of the long list on the front cover and placed it into the out-tray. Glancing up at the clock on the wall she decided to stop for the day. The _"done"_ pile was nice and high and she'd even managed to dispense with some of the _"bloody impossible"_s. All in all a good day's work.

There were still a few more things to see to before she could leave and accordingly Tilda spent a good twenty minutes tidying up her desk and ensuring all her reference files and books were back in the right places. Others may be able to work in a slovenly tip, but though she constantly protested that she wasn't finicky Tilda simply thought it was nicer to work in an environment where everything was in its correct place. The office finally cleaned to her satisfaction Tilda pulled on her coat and, after pausing for a minute to smarten her hair in the reflective glass of the large windows and locked the door conscientiously behind her.

Walking along the silent empty corridors Tilda found herself once again reliving old memories. The scent of chemicals still drifted along these corridors, temptingly full of possibilities. They were more familiar now, these friendly walls, flights of stairs that led to lecture theatres she had sat in, corridors that branched off from the main stem down which friends and colleagues had their offices. The guild was home now, no longer a terrifying forest of half seen shadows and constant threat. She had overcome so much as she'd journeyed from those first frightened steps to her present position. Surely that was cause for hope? If she could clamber over all that and emerge on the other side if not victorious then at least only mildly scorched then maybe two old friends could find a way to navigate through these difficult shoals.

Magda had left her and Magda had apologised. She had walked out on Magda and even now she didn't know the full consequences of that. But surely she could make the decision to face them without flinching when such consequences were eventually revealed. That would count for something. To be sure, Tilda didn't have any answers, but they'd not had any answers in those long ago simpler days and it had still been OK. She was still willing to try. If only Magda would give her some kind of sign. The foyer opened before her and crossing the empty expanse Tilda smiled sweetly at the half awake guard, pushed open the heavy doors and, conscious of a job well done, left to enjoy the remains of her weekend.


	5. I Pray You Love, Remember

**4: I Pray You Love, Remember**

A young woman walks through the streets of Ankh Morpork in the fading chill of an early spring morning. Old eyes in that young body adsorb the fact that the drowsy morning sun is glinting on the roof tops and beginning to warm the walls of the houses lining the streets that are empty at this hour. She remembers cold winter mornings not too far behind now, struggling against a freezing wind through wet streets and the comparison warms her. Her steps take her into the main market place, bustling later, but at this time quiet with only the most committed stall owners up and about, setting out their wares. She pauses beside a flower stall, disturbing the merchant who was adjusting the placement of the flowers in tall buckets of water. He turns, not pleased to be interrupted, but she apologises and explains her need to purchase a flower.

"A rose, the palest yellow or cream you have, but not white."

"How many do you want luv?" He reaches for the relevant container, pulling out a bunch of delicate buds that match her enquiry.

"Just the one please." She examines the bunch of blooms in his hand closely before picking a single perfect example.

He offers to wrap it but she wants to take it as it is, the water still glistening on the stem. She pays and leaves him, carrying it carefully, ensuring as the streets get busier that it comes to no harm. Before long she reaches her objective, the Engineering Guild, and climbs the shallow steps to the large imposing foyer. The day guard is just starting his shift, and the handover is still in process behind the reception desk. They look up at the sound of her footfalls on the marble, but recognising her, smile and return to their paperwork.

"I'm just going to pop up and put something on her desk, is that ok?"

She is waved through without comment and makes her way towards the wide staircase curling up into the building. Two flights up she wanders into the long light filled room, the rows of drawing tables tilted like sails in the morning sun. Moving with assurance through the clutter she reaches the office jutting into the room, half windowed. The door is unlocked as per usual and she enters without hesitation. Walking up to the large desk that dominates the room she places the rose with infinite care in the centre of the cluttered surface, on top of the large drawing spread out and held down with various mugs of suspicious cleanliness.

It seems incongruous lying there. Beautiful, glowing even in the light drifting into the office through the glass separating it from the main room. She stands there a moment, gazing at the delicate petals before stroking it with a single light finger and turning to go. With her hand on the door, about to leave she recollects something, turns back to the desk and taking up the ever-ready notebook scribbles two lines. Tearing off the sheet she folds it in two and slides it under the long stem of the rose.

As she leaves, boots clattering across the floor of the main foyer she nods to the day guard. Coming down the last of the wide steps into the street she notes the time on the building across the roadway and turning away picks up her pace as she hurries towards the working world that expects her.

~X~

The rose lay there untouched until Senior Engineer Matilda Tewt walked into the office and shut the door firmly behind her. Her co-workers had looked up in surprise to see her arriving so late, and then looked again as they noticed the shadows under her eyes made more prominent by her pallor. Curious glances had been exchanged all over the room as that door was closed so decisively, Tewt was known for generally operating an open door policy. Leaning tiredly against the door Matilda heard the murmuring break out in the room behind her and then die away again and was once again grateful for the decorum of her staff. She really couldn't face them. _Not today_.

Standing there, the solidity of the door at her back a sort of strange sanctuary she allowed the quiet to envelop her, opening her eyes at last to gaze around the familiar space. It was then that she saw the rose. Moving the few steps to the desk she stood staring, trying to place this small piece of delicate beauty. Why was it here and who had brought it – through the entire Guild – on this of all days? Eventually she noticed the note beneath, folded so simply. She pulled it out and unfolded it. There were two lines only, written in a curving hand on the paper.

_I'm here if you need me._  
_I'll swing by at 4 when my shift finishes_

It was unsigned. Matilda touched the rose with a gentle finger, unconsciously echoing the earlier gesture of the deliverer. Leaving it on the desk she moved round the piece of furniture, settling into her chair and turning to examine the latest chemical reports. But every few minutes she would stop, raise her head and look again at the rose.

~X~

Magda wandered through the streets of Ankh Morpork, enjoying the warmth of the late afternoon spring sun through her jacket. Arriving at the Engineers Guild she quickly ran up the steps and weaved through the now busier foyer to the reception desk. The guard looked up at her approach and flicked a finger to call over one of the young runners they used to pass messages between floors.

"She said if you came I was to call up for her."

She smiled for him in gratitude, finding it once again easy to hide the real reason she was here and remained leaning on the high counter. For all she was listening to him talking about the spring weather, her eyes kept returning to the staircase, waiting for the sight.

Tilda came walking down the stairs slowly, a heavy tread unlike her usual light step. Her head was lowered, face hidden behind hair swinging forward and she held a single pale rose in one hand. Magda made her goodbyes and wandered over to the foot of the staircase, waiting as the slighter woman came down the last flight. Tilda said nothing but merely slipped gratefully within the encircling arm that wrapped around her in gentle support. Magda felt no need to speak either and fitting the tired form against her side she held the woman close for a moment before they continued walking, out into the sunshine and down the shallow steps.

It was quite a walk to the Small Gods Cemetery and they made the journey in silence. Tilda didn't step away and Magda didn't withdraw her arm. But as they passed underneath the heavy gates Tilda felt the apprehension that was growing in her companion and paused.

"Not the church" Magda whispered and Tilda nodded, acknowledging her hesitation and pointing instead to the path leading further into the cemetery.

They made their way up to the top of the graveyard, settling on a sun-warmed bench. It was quiet amongst the graves at this time of day, a few isolated mourners and in the distance, the verger tidying one of the paths. In the silence Matilda could hear the birds singing in the trees that were planted amongst the stones. It was a beautiful day. Looking back she realised it had almost always been a beautiful day as over the years Spring had taken the opportunity to model a wide variety of different bonnets for her. Sometimes it helped and sometimes it didn't. _Today it didn't_. Tilda gazed out over the city through eyes burning with unshed tears. She was so tired of crying. Tired of the ache and the loneliness that came with the burden of grief carried unaided. Last year had been terrible, she had been amongst people to whom this day meant nothing, people to whom she couldn't reveal her pain. Last year, like the year before and every year since that first time she'd faced this day alone, had been difficult. But her dark thoughts were penetrated by the warm comforting strength of the arm around her shoulders.

"You remembered."

"I never forgot." Withdrawing her arm Magda reached down and lifted up the backpack she'd been carrying. She reached in and pulled out a plainly wrapped package, placing it across her lap.

"I didn't know what to get this year. Eight is a difficult age." As though it was the most natural thing in the world she wrapped Matilda in that strong arm again, resting it on the back of the bench, there to support but not invade. "I thought she'd think herself too old for toys, reckoned she'd be into drawing, like her mother."

Her hand was resting on Tilda's upper arm and unconsciously she began to stroke a single finger back and forth over the tension held there. One hand placed safely on the brown paper Tilda just let herself sit for a moment, the calming touch somehow lifting away a little of the weight from her shoulders with each gentle repetition.

Eventually she picked up the parcel. Undoing the string, the paper fell away to reveal a pad of good drawing paper and a collection of pencils of varying softness. Tilda took the pad and turned it over in her hands.

"Last year was easier," Magda's voice softened; her finger still soothing back and forth in gentle caress on that arm, an absent-minded comfort. "She was younger, simpler to buy for. I got her a doll. Wasn't the best doll I admit, I'd only just started working and could only scrape a little together. But it was recognisably a doll."

"I'm sure she would have thought it was brilliant." Tilda slid down the bench a little to better rest her head on the shoulder offered to her for that purpose and the supporting arm about her adjusted to the new position, gathering her in close.

They sat together in silence, watching the shadows walk on long legs over the mown grass as the sun slid down over the city.

~X~


End file.
